One thing I've been doing more of since I relocated my photo business (back in 2014) to Colorado, is shooting more personal work. I love working on personal projects, as they allow me the freedom to test out ideas I've been floating around and make some work I'm really excited about. Sometimes the results I get are thrilling, and other times they come up short. But you can't win unless you play, right? So even though it can be scary venturing into the territory of controlling a project 100% start to finish, you definitely learn along the way, and grow as a photographer..... so it's totally worth jumping in!
So what inspired this personal project? I love animals.... like of ALL kinds. I used to play with the snakes, frogs, and salamanders that I would find in our pool growing up, or in the natural pools that would gather at the base of our cliff. I actually have a photo of me reliving this childhood experience from a college project on community and home ---> Ahhh.... I miss those times.
As I've grown, my curiosity and wonder for the animals we share this planet with is still strong, and so I was super excited to get to work with a group of creatures that most of us don't get to meet in our day to day lives. With the help of Devin and one of their animal handlers, Eric, Nature's Educators let us capture the images below utilizing some of the animals they care for. If you don't know about these guys, they offer great programs where they bring their animals to you for customized wildlife educational programs. Their mission is to teach anyone and everyone about the importance of birds of prey and get excited about wildlife.
So with this project I wanted to paint some of the creatures in a new light. Use my product photography experience to look at these guys with a fresh perspective and, hopefully, also get people excited about wildlife.
If you'd like to see more of these images, you can view the personal project gallery. We just did another visit to the wildlife center today, and are in the process of planning and prop shopping for installment 2 of the series. On the the potential call list for round 2: a burmese python, a rosy boa, some blue tongued skinks, a giant leopard tortoise, an alligator, an adorable barred owl, a teensy screech owl, some whites tree frogs, giant millipedes, a plated lizard, a tiny scorpion, and a gila monster!..... to start :)